


Hiveflight

by SchrodingersKitten



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Biotechnology, Gen, Juggalo induced violence, Pesterlog(s) (Homestuck), SBURB Fan Session, Senseless Alternian Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-10
Updated: 2017-12-10
Packaged: 2019-02-13 03:29:45
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,268
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12974907
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SchrodingersKitten/pseuds/SchrodingersKitten
Summary: 10 trolls play a game, and things get a little out of hand.





	Hiveflight

**Author's Note:**

> Because no one has made a good Sburbfic in a while.

A young troll stands in his dilapidated seashore hovel. Though it was 7 sweeps ago he was given life, it is only 7 weeks from now that he will have it taken away. What is his name?

> Enter name

Yes, that's right, your name is KELPIE KABUTO. As was previously mentioned, you are living on borrowed time, due to circumstances unique to yourself and that you would really rather not talk about right now, thank you very much. This personal judgment day happens to coincide with the DATE OF EXILE, when all the young trolls on Alternia within a particular post-pubescent shall be rounded up, examined, and sent off world to claim new systems for the Empress. For you, it is more akin to a trial.

The knowledge of your immanent demise has not stopped you from taking interest in a wide variety of amusements. You are a savant of HISTORY, particularly POLITICAL AND MARTIAL. You should really be proud of your STRATEGIC WIT, but your seadwelling caste is expected to be expert in such things anyway. You are also quite skilled at ESCAPOLOGY and a master of TRACKING. It has been said that you will inevitably slip through the fingers of any pursuer, and in tern inevitably pursue them. If you reach the AGE OF MATURATION, you would like to create ripples that forever alter Alternian society and make a better future for those such as yourself, and then retire to focus on your METALWORKING.

You pass the days by chatting with friends on a new client, TROLLIAN. It is much simpler and much less outdated than PRONGLE, despite its nature as a throwback to INSTANT MESSENGERS. Geez, why did we even get rid of those things in the first place? Your trolltag is incarceratedUsurper and you speak vvit}{ a quiet and }{eavvily accented vvoice.

Before your exile, you will play a game with 9 friends that proves to be your salvation. You do not currently know this, and you spend your days in anxious anticipation of your eventual culling.

> Get Dressed.

Due to your horrid living conditions, you lack the luxury of a high-tech WARDOBIFIER and instead must make due with a peasantly WARDROBE. Fortunately, it does a perfectly fine job of holding your various DRESSES and DESIGNER SHADES. After all is said and done, you're looking pretty fly for a tide guy.

> Retrieve Arms From Wrapping.

You unwrap your prized creation, the MA-TSU JI. You crafted this double-bladed ji from steel recovered from a shipwreck when you were only six sweeps old. It remains your finest creation.

You allocate it to your POLEARMKIND specibus.

> Examine Hive.

It's not really much of a hive. You're currently staying in an old fishing shack on the coast of a providence in Alternia's eastern hemisphere. You have a small generator running to power your husktop and your recupercoon is little more than a series of formerly elegant pillows you've soaked in soporslime. Paper lanterns are hung for lighting. You've set up a simple forge on the lawnring.

Out some 25 yards is an underwater nuclear bunker. You shelter there when things get to real on the surface. It's also where you keep your SHAMEFUL COLLECTION.

Your husktop is dinging. Someone is trolling you.

> Answer Troll.

\---vivaciousRobin [VR] began trolling incarceratedUsurper [IU]\---

VR: HEY KELPIE  
VR: HEY KELPIE  
VR: HEY  
VR: I KNOW YOURE AT YOUR HIVE  
VR: & I WILL JUST KEEP MESSAGING YOU UNTIL YOU &SWER  
IU: fine, yes, i'm }{ere.  
IU: vv}{at is it?  
VR: WANNA PLAY A GAME  
IU: depends.  
IU: are you dm?  
VR: NO NOT THAT KINd OF GAME  
VR: THIS IS A VIdEO GAME  
IU: is it team?  
VR: YEAH ALL THE PLAYERS ARE ON ONE TEAM  
VR: AT LEAST AS FAR AS I KNOW  
IU: i don't }{avve a lot of money rig}{t novv.  
VR: I THOUGH YOU GUYS WERE LOAd&d  
IU: it's complicated.  
VR: ANYWAY IT SHOULD BE FREE  
VR: IC HAS A TORR&  
IU: torrand?  
IU: o}{. your quirk is really annoying sometimes.  
VR: SHUT UP  
VR: SO ARE YOU IN OR ARE YOU IN  
IU: i guess i'm in.  
VR: SWEET  
VR: GOTTA GO  
VR: LUSUS BROUGHT SOMETHING GROSS AS HELL HOME  
IU: later.

\---vivaciousRobin [VR] ceased trolling incarceratedUsurper [IU]\---

\---vivaciousRobin [VR] began trolling incarceratedUsurper [IU]\---

VR: d&d YOU IMPLY I AM A BAd dM

\---incarceratedUsurper [IU] ceased trolling vivaciousRobin [VR]\---

She is the worst DM.

>Go On Lookout.

You climb onto the roof of your hovel and prepare to begin your nightly watch. You never know what is right around the corner.

You grab your telescope and captchalogue it in your SUN TZU MODUS. The specibus allocates each object to a certain chapter of Troll Art of War, including the preface in your translation which describes the work as "really good, but somewhat outdated". Fortunately, the modus was updated recently so that the item no longer has to correlate to the chapter in any way, which is convenient, since it really reduced the variety of what you could add to your collection. To retrieve the item, it's corresponding chapter much be recited in the original East Alternian. You're lucky they're short.

=====>

You sit on the roof for some hours, occasionally looking through your telescope. It isn't until fairly late in the night that you start seeing drones. Looks like you're going in hiding tonight.

You gather up your husktop, double check your ji, and head out to the shallows, preparing to go to your nuclear hideout. Where you will be surrounded by your shame.

> KELPIE: Abscond.

While Kelpie submerges, you take the opportunity to be someone else.

A tealblood is in her respiteblock. What is her name?

>Enter Name

Your name is HARVER BALIST. Your interests include, but are not limited to, BIOTECHNOLOGY AND NECROTECHNOLOGY. You spend hours each day assembling simple devices from the corpses of beasts. You are also something of a DANCER, although you remain INCREDIBLY OBSCURE, hopefully not due to talent. When you grow up, you dream of being an EDUCASTRATOR, filling the minds of young trolls with state-sanctioned knowledge and helping them develop into functioning members of society with firm discipline.

Your trolltag is tappingShade and you type Like a reasonable fucking person, regardless of what moldy, century old trends demand of you.

>Examine Hive.

Your block is an absolute mess. Papers are strewn everywhere and your leather bound literature organizer has it's top shelf falling off. It is often difficult to find what you're looking for (although you eventually do. You always do.), but you don't much mind the mess. You often salvage the cheese rodents that visit your block for spare parts.

Covering about half the block is the space you use as a workshop. This is marginally more clean, with all your tools in their appropriate carrying bags and a crisp blue tarp covering the floor, which you change whenever it becomes too congested with blood and oil.

Although you mostly use the rooms on this upper level for storage, downstairs you have a large ballroom, a larger foyer, and your various necessary amenity blocks.

>Examine Workbench.

You look over your workbench. It's beginning to fall susceptible to a bit of clutter, so you tidy up. You captchalogue a DRUGDOG in your binary modus. The DRUGDOG is one of your more useful inventions, manufacturing and dispensing sopor slime and other medical substances inside its body and then dispensing the from a nozzle in it's stomach. The binary modus functions by assigning each atom in the object a value of "yes" or "no" and translating those values into binary code, allowing for infinite combinations in the modus. You also captchalogue on of your reconnaissance devices, the SNEAKE, a danger noodle outfitted with recording devices that monitor the audio, video, and temperature of wherever they're sent.

You also allocate a stray scalpel to your BLADEKIND SPECIBUS. After tidying away some papers, the workbench looks nicely organized.

>Grab Husktop.

You don't own a husktop. Such things are technologically outdated and aesthetically unpleasing. You use the superior alternative, a scaletop. Reptilian technology is the future. And, admittedly, a little lewd.

You captchalogue the scaletop.

Sounds like someone is having a party downstairs. And, uh, is that smoke you smell?

>Investigate.

Yes, just as you thought, your lusus has wrecked the foyer again. She really doesn't appreciate the refined taste of your REPTILIAN MEGAFAUNA portraits. Such beautiful, toned muscles rippling beneath soft underbellies and rugged scales, their mighty fangs glistening in the lusty moonlight.

While you disagree with the classical critics that the mammalian form is the superior subject, anthropomorphic beasts remain stimulating and alluring to the troll eye.

Currently, a good portion of your collection is on fire or shredded. You've already fireproofed this room. You should go check up on your lusus. She's probably just hungry.

>Search cookingblock.

Yes, she's in the kitchen, right where you expected her to be. Your QUASIMECHANICAL PYRORAPTOR LUSUS is attempting to open the refrigerator. A column of flame erupts from her mouth and badly scorches it's metal chassis. She's not a clever girl.

She turns and screeches at you, small tongues of flames escaping the sides of her mouth. It appears she's mistaken you for food again. Guess it's time to take care of this.

>Strife.

You draw your scalpel and make shallow cuts on the scaly skin surrounding the machinery you've augmented her with. She takes offense to that and launches her mounted missiles. A portion of the wall explodes, and she escapes through the hole. To be honest, you fully expected her to attack you in some way.

As you turn to return to your room, you step on a mine she left for you and are blasted against the opposite wall.

Your scaletop dings.

>Answer.

You take a moment to compose yourself and bandage your horrific leg burns before responding on Trollian.

\---illogicalCheapskate [IC] began trolling tappingShade [TS]\---

IC: ....  
IC: Hello  
TS: Hey man.  
IC: I was, wondering, if, now, would be a good time, to discuss something, with, you  
TS: Is it about the game?  
IC: You, know about, the game?  
TS: Dude, I know you know I know about everything.  
TS: You've been trying to pick up players all week.  
IC: I, see...  
IC: So, about, the time  
TS: Not a great time honestly.  
TS: My fucking lusus just fucking punked me.  
TS: I need to fix a wall.  
IC: You, do your own, repairs?  
TS: Haha, no.  
TS: The walls in my hive are like 80% meat.  
TS: I just have to disinfect the wound so they'll heal properly.  
IC: That is, perhaps, the most dis...gusting, thing I have ever heard.  
TS: It's just like a really low maintenance pet and a low maintenance structure rolled into one.  
TS: It's fucking rad.  
IC: I see.  
IC: So, can I, count on your in...volvement, in the game?  
TS: Yeah, I'll play.  
TS: Now if you'll excuse me, I need to lick my wounds.

\---tappingShade [TS] ceased trolling illogicalCheapskate [IC]\---

You pass out.

>Harver: Be IC

You are now IC.

>Enter Name  
Your name is BOLIAN JACPRE. Your interests include HACKING and POETRY. You were the one who discovered the files for a game called SGRUB floating around on forums and began collecting friends to play with you. You have no idea what playing this game will entail, but are nonetheless eager.

Your trolltag is illogicalCheapskate and you speak in a very, dis...jointed manner, that is, simultaneously pleasing, and dreadfully... annoying.

It looks like you have a few messages.

>Answer Trollian.

\---razorousCowgirl [RC] began trolling illogicalCheapskate [IC]\---

RC: ---j- what is up my dud3  
IC: Hello, RC.  
IC: I take it, you are, messaging me, about the, game?  
RC: ---j- what a 9al cant just hit up h3r bro to chat  
IC: No, I don't, believe, so,  
IC: Seeing as, you hold, barely masked contempt, for everyone.  
RC: ---j- tru3 that tru3 that  
RC: ---j- y3ah i want to play  
IC: Will you, promise me, that you will not, kill anyone?  
RC: ---j- nah  
IC: Okay, that is, fair, I suppose.  
IC: But will you, at least, for me, try to hold off.  
RC: ---j- for how lon9  
IC: I, don't know, like, an hour?  
RC: ---j- sounds 9ood to m3  
IC: Thank you.  
RC: ---j- how would i 3v3n kill anyon3  
RC: ---j- do you 3xp3ct me to lik3  
RC: ---j- walk to th3ir hiv3  
RC: ---j- and bash th3m ov3r the h3ad  
RC: ---j- with lik3  
RC: ---j- lar93 rocks  
RC: ---j- callin9 th3m h3r3tics  
IC: That is, exactly a thing, you have done before.  
RC: ---j- y3ah but i n33d to know if p3opl3 3xp3ct it now  
IC: We do.  
RC: ---j- w3ll tittyshit  
IC: If that, will be all, I have, another friend, mess...aging me.  
RC: ---j- y3ah bro just want3d to r3s3rve my spot  
IC: Spot... reserved.

\---illogicalCheapskate [IC] ceased trolling razorousCowgirl [RC]\---

\---vivaciousRobin [VR] began trolling illogicalCheapskate [IC]\---

VR: I GOT KELPIE TO PLAY  
IC: The, sea...dweller?  
VR: YEAH  
VR: IS THAT A PROBLEM  
IC: No, no, the more, the merrier.  
IC: I just, did not, know you knew, him.  
VR: I KNOW LOTS OF PEOPLE  
VR: I KNOW PURPLE BLOOdS & GOLd BLOOdS & THRESHICUTIONERS & MEOW BEAST OWNERS  
IC: You, know, threshicutioners?  
VR: dONT FUCK WITH ME BITCH  
IC: Duly noted.  
VR: HEY AFTER WERE dONE WITH THIS GAME  
VR: WANNA PLAY IN A C&AIGN IM dMING  
IC: I don't, play, tabletop, roleplaying games.  
VR: ITS NEVER TOO LATE TO START  
IC: I, challenge that.  
VR: FINE LOSER  
VR: dONT BE A KICKASS PALAdIN OR WIZARd OR WHATEVER  
IC: I, thought, classes were like, guard, and pauper, and shit.  
VR: THAT IS A VERY WEIRd MISCONCEPTION  
VR: I THINK YOURE THINKING OF BACKGROUNdS  
VR: WHICH IS SHIT LIKE FOLK HEROES & HEIRS  
IC: I see.  
IC: How are, things, over there?  
VR: PRETTY GOOD  
VR: MY LUSUS IS BEING RAdICALLY NASTY & THE HIGHBLOOdS ARE STILL USING THIS ROAd  
VR: SO AT LEAST I GOT FOOd ON THE FLAT& REPAST SURFACE  
IC: Good, good.  
IC: I worry, about you, sometimes.  
IC: You're doing, very, danger...ous work.  
VR: ILL BE FINE  
VR: GOT YEARS OF EXPERIENCE  
IC: It's still, illegal, and violent.  
IC: Just.  
IC: Be safe, okay?  
VR: YOU GOT IT MOM

\---vivaciousRobin [VR] ceased trolling illogicalCheapskate [IC]\---

IC: What's, a mom.

>Examine Hive.

Your hive is extraordinarily neat. Your lusus cleans it twice a day and you personally run a tight ship as well. All your equipment is cordoned off in one corner of the room, while on your desk sits one of many journals full of poetry. The rest are stowed away in the ATTIC for some young troll to find decades after your death and make you famous.

Posters and postcards depicting various other planets line your wall. Some are fictional, while others were taken off-world. You aren't really sure which is which. In your closet, in a mahogany box, is your weapon.

>Retrieve Weapon.

You open the mahogany box and allocate your TECHNOCHROMATIC CAUTERIZER to your LASERKIND SPECIBUS. The Cauterizer is the most advanced laser sword on the markets these days, allowing the user to slice and dice unfortunate trolls in all the colors of the hemospectrum.

You neatly tuck the box back into the closet.

>Inspect Posters.

You look over your posters depicting various planets and solar systems. They capture your imagination immensely and good deal of your poetry focuses upon the romance of the cold, cruel vacuum of space, where this is no life or harm.

You carefully analyze the poster of the Tyrian Plateau on Romicom VII. Oh, dear, sweet, Romicom, how you long for it. You can only hope you're stationed there upon reaching maturation, perhaps as some kind of INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY OPPRESSOR.

Actually, you're not sure Romicom VII is a real place.

You hear something snuffling downstairs. You sure hope your lusus isn't breeding again. You don't want to have to put down anymore of his babies.

>See To Lusus.

Oh, no, Flopkins is just rolling around, collecting dirt. You didn't realize it was that time of the day. His long ears fold back against his perfectly spherical, furry body as he rolls around to collect the dust he eats. 

He's a good boy, except when....

>Strife.

He tries to eat your foot. You gently nudge him under a table and abscond.

Looks like he found something.

>Pick Up Something.

You approach the small object and captchalogue it in your SCHRODINGER'S MODUS so he doesn't accidentally swallow it. The modus operates by picking up an object when it is perceived as being inside the modus, and releasing it when it is perceived as outside the modus. When the object is not being perceived in any particular way, it is simultaneously inside and outside the modus, until is it observed as being one or the other. This effectively allows others to retrieve items from your modus just by acknowledging them, and you to collect effectively any object simply by assuming you already have it.

You assume you currently have the SILVER KEY, and therefore you do.

>Finish Game Preparations.

You set down on your husktop and add the final touches to the organization of the game.

\---CURRENT illogicalCheapskate [CIC] RIGHT NOW opened memo on board SPICE---

CIC: Alright, this is, the board, for all of our, players, and, friends.  
CIC: Just made this, so that we, would have a place, to talk, about game stuff.  
CURRENT vivaciousRobin [CVR] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CVR: IM REAdIED UP  
CURRENT razorousCowgirl [CRC] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CRC: ---;- y3ah im h3r3  
CURRENT incarceratedUsurper [CIU] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CIU: I'll be on later.  
CIU: Kind of got my }{ands full rig}{t novv.  
CURRENT tappingShade [CTS] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CTS: What, trying to avoid eye contact with your weirdo collection?  
CIU: }{ey }{ovv about you s}{ut t}{e fuck up.  
CTS: Tasteless perv.  
CURRENT ghastlyDoomsday [CGD] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.

CGD: pplease ddont ffight youll uhpset them  
CTS: Oh, don't be like that.  
CTS: You know I'm just a little ornery after my naps.  
CGD: I ddint know you uh sslept  
CURRENT hellishAesthete [CHA] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CHA: When are we go1ng 2 start?  
CIC: To...night.  
CURRENT insectoidPlague [CIP] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CIP: wh@ts with @ll this "current" stuff  
CIC: Maybe, older, messages get, timed.  
CIC: Not, really, sure.  
CURRENT dyingDiplomat [CDD] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CDD: I HOPE EVERYONE WILL BE CORDIAL AND RESTRAINED DURING THIS ENDEAVOR.  
CDD: PLEASE REMEMBER WE ARE ALL ON ONE TEAM.  
CRC: ---;- hahaha no  
CHA: Inb4 DD 1s PKed.  
CURRENT spectralCuisine [CSC] RIGHT NOW responded to memo.  
CSC: g-t wr-ck-d h-n-stly.  
CDD: IM SORRY.  
CDD: DONT LET ME STOP YOU FROM THROWING THE GAME.  
CDD: I GUESS.  
CRC: ---;- you wont

Your friends are just delightful.

>Examine Neighborhood.

You walk outside into the warm Alternian night.

The lawnrings are bustling with activity. Trolls are tending to the turf, drones are harassing the token bronzeblood, and insects howl in the darkness. Space grinds along it's cosmic route, the distance between objects full of gross and base matter, as a thoughtsponge fills the hollow of a troll's cerebral osseal dome, giving the gift of sentience. An imperceptible note is produced. It's the one Creation plays to mark it's uncaring dominion over all of existence. It is your 7th wriggling day, and as with all six preceding it, the world seems woefully incomplete, a riddle waiting to be solved.

HIVEFLIGHT.


End file.
